Access to electrical sockets for charging the battery of, or supplying electrical power to, an electrical device is currently often either non-existent or free in public places such as hotels, stations, trains, airports, etc.
In the first case, this is a real problem for users who need to charge electrical devices such as their smartphones, tablets or laptop computers.
In the other case, the problem of the cost of the power thus offered to users for free arises, without forgetting the cost of maintaining the electrical sockets. It is necessary then to have a method or a unit to be able to bill for the service of charging the electrical device.
This issue arises, for example, in the case of charging electric vehicles, and solutions proposing charging points available to the general public exist. Such a solution is, for example, described in the international patent application PCT/EP2012/053032. The system described in this patent application allows the electrical power used when charging an electric vehicle to be billed. This system makes it possible to identify the vehicle to be charged and to bill for the charging operation. The described solution is complex, however, and depends on standardized communication between the charging point and the vehicle via e.g. a CAN (Controller Area Network, ISO 11898) bus on board the vehicle.
Another solution is presented, for example, in the American patent application US2010332308. Such a solution makes it possible to bill for the charging operation, the owner of the smartphone being able to make the payment directly by e.g. bank card over a payment terminal installed beside the charging point. This system has the drawback of depending on the addition of a payment terminal, thereby substantially increasing the cost of such an installation, not to mention the costs involved in maintaining such payment terminals.
Other solutions exist, making it possible to identify electrical devices and to bill for the charging of these electrical devices, such as e.g. the Smart Energy Solutions system proposed by Sony™. This solution may however not be applied to existing electrical device pools without obliging each user to use a specific charging cable, e.g. integrating an NFC-type chip in order to identify the electrical device or its user.
It will also be noted that all of the charging solutions depending on the electrical device to be charged playing an active role become inoperable if the battery of the device is fully discharged. This is the case, for example, of the solution presented in the international patent application PCT/EP2012/053032. This is a major drawback of these solutions.